Some local traders allegedly thrashed a police party in Pakistan's Badin city in Sindh province when they tried to impose COVID-19 protocols and asked them to close the shop.

The incident reportedly occurred in the cloth market of Shahi Bazaar, IBNS said quoting local media.

Onlookers told local reporters that despite strict orders from the provincial government to keep all business and commercial activities suspended this week as part of lockdown, shopkeepers in the market were selling their goods by pulling up the shutters upon arrival of customers, reports Dawn News.

The uniforms of the policemen were torn during the scuffle, reports said.

While those involved in the violence managed to escape, some other shopkeepers told the reporters that they were running their businesses without fully pulling up the shutters “with consent of the area police”, reports Dawn News.

“This time, police visited the bazaar without any intimation and used foul language. That’s why some of the shopkeepers reacted violently,” they said.

Police said they would arrest the people involved in the incident soon.